Abstract
Progress in cancer treatment is indisputable and concerns all therapeutic areas: surgery, radiotherapy and medical oncology. This progress has been made possible by fundamental and clinical research, at national and international level, which is a source of great enthusiasm for clinicians and researchers alike. Pink October for instance, is a month of great hope for the general public, patients and their carers.
Alas, the reality is not so pink! All this progress comes at a cost, not only in countries with high standards of living, but also in LMICs (Low- and Middle-Income Countries), and amid the general elation of progress, a few Cassandras are trying to alert decision-makers to a health catastrophe looming on the horizon.
The aim of this article is to provide a succinct analysis of the main costs and their recent growth, and to suggest ways of trying to curb this exponential growth in costs so as not to ultimately generate frustration and inadequate or insufficient treatment for our patients.
This article is not intended as a political pamphlet against any particular company, but rather as an alert to our colleagues in the medical and research community, based on a selection of works from the international literature and filtered through personal experience in hospitals and sometimes in humanitarian medicine.This work is necessarily incomplete, according with the numerous aspects of cancer management and the number of people implicated.